Ah, beautiful, delicate irony. I becomes apparent that I spoke too soon when I confessed to feeling satisfied for the first time in years — within hours of my last post, our landlords called to tell us they’re selling our home.
We love living in this area, and our landlords have been brilliant: it is no exaggeration to say that they’re the first positive experience we’ve had, from either side of the rental market (and in two countries to boot). From the get-go they were accommodating (hyuk hyuk) — letting me view the property before it was officially available; waiting patiently for our security bond; organising all those typical rental-property things from afar whilst trying to get their own feet on the ground in a new country. Unfortunately (for us), they have indeed established themselves — and they're not coming back.
Hence the sale.
(Just to show how positive our experiences have been with them, they have even offered us “first dibs” on buying the property. We almost certainly can’t afford it, of course: property prices in Sydney are ridiculous. But we will be speaking to a financial planner once we’ve liquidated some pre-IPO stock-options of a certain Silicon Valley juggernaut, for some much needed advice.)
If we have to move, we’re hoping we can stay nearby — we want J to attend the school here, for one thing, and even if we can’t snap up this house we will be looking for a place to call our own sooner or later. Ideally we’ll even stay on the street — we’ve only recently started hanging out with our neighbours a few doors up (the Masons, would you believe?), and seeing our boy playing with the other kids “from the block” is a beautiful thing indeed.
This weekend has been both busy and eventful.
On Saturday Dee announced that we were having “a day off” — which translates to ONLY tidying up the house, a job which took some of Sunday too. Even as I undermine it, I have to admit that it was a pleasant change to have Dee skip yoga in the morning, and not have to rush off to swimming lessons for Jules.
Instead, we tidied (as mentioned) and took Jules to the toy-store (I forget what that was for, but he bought himself a mini Venus (Fireman Sam)) and we went for a late-ish lunch at the new Grill’d that has opened on Norton Street. Yum! I had a beer, which was possibly a mistake; continuing the clean-up job was definitely harder in the afternoon, and I didn’t get around to any more undercoating of the back porch.
… not that it matters, since our landlord rang while I was playing in Jules’ room. We rang her back, but already suspected the worst — they’re staying in France, and therefore selling 301 Nelson Street. (To be fair, I actually expected her to tell us that they were returning, and would therefore need us to move out. Either way, we’re moving.)
Today we got up at 6am to catch two trains to the start of the Blackmore’s Running Festival, aka the Sydney Marathon. Sure, we only ran the Bridge Run (9km in an official 1hr30something, but at an unofficial average Strava pace of 09:something min/km — and that’s pushing a pram!), but it was a good distance for the three of us and I was happy to see Dee cheering up after the news about “our” house.
I better go to bed, or I’ll get in trouble. If I can’t sleep — I’ve mixed a coffee with wine (not literally, mind you!) which may fight the exercise fatigue — then perhaps I’ll sneak back upstairs for some more writing.
